Is it considered to be committing suicide?

[longhorn09]

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Please refers to my mdapp acct. for more of my info.

So.....I know in principle everyone should apply to all of his/her state schools, and it's the golden rule here in sdn. Here's my story: I'm a Texas resident, and hey, there are 7 Texas state schools, which is great. Yup. The problem is, they all use tmdsas instead of amcas. And I transferred to a US college like 3 years ago from a foreign country. I completed my freshmen eduacation overseas. For applying med schools, I already know that all the prereq courses has to be taken here in US, so I retook everything that I took in HongKong (my hometown). I know for long that amcas doesn't care about my overseas transcript at all, which is great. What I've just found out is that tmdsas requires my overseas transcript to be sent to them. Fine, as long as they don't count my foregin courses towards my gpa. And it's cheap too, it's just cost my foreign college about $5 to send the transcript. But what I've just found out is that tmdsas also request me to send my transcript to an evaluating agent to evaluate my transcript, and HOLY SHXT, the cheapest agent costs $130 for that!

I think the cost is just insane, and I hate tmdsas and think they're stupid. Amcas doesn't care about my foreign transcript and tmdsas needs to cost my that many time and money and troubles!

So...here's my question:
1) If I just apply to all the schools I listed in my MDapp acct. minus all the TX state schools (while I'll still apply to Baylor coz it uses amcas), is it considered to be committing suicide?

2) If option 1 is not too silly to do, in what way should I modify my list of schools so I will still be accepted in the 2010 cycle?

3) Can anyone tell me if I'm stupid or what? Please give me some feedback and tell me what to do.

Thanks
-longhorn09

 

[flip26]

Please refers to my mdapp acct. for more of my info.

So.....I know in principle everyone should apply to all of his/her state schools, and it's the golden rule here in sdn. Here's my story: I'm a Texas resident, and hey, there are 7 Texas state schools, which is great. Yup. The problem is, they all use tmdsas instead of amcas. And I transferred to a US college like 3 years ago from a foreign country. I completed my freshmen eduacation overseas. For applying med schools, I already know that all the prereq courses has to be taken here in US, so I retook everything that I took in HongKong (my hometown). I know for long that amcas doesn't care about my overseas transcript at all, which is great. What I've just found out is that tmdsas requires my overseas transcript to be sent to them. Fine, as long as they don't count my foregin courses towards my gpa. And it's cheap too, it's just cost my foreign college about $5 to send the transcript. But what I've just found out is that tmdsas also request me to send my transcript to an evaluating agent to evaluate my transcript, and HOLY SHXT, the cheapest agent costs $130 for that!

I think the cost is just insane, and I hate tmdsas and think they're stupid. Amcas doesn't care about my foreign transcript and tmdsas needs to cost my that many time and money and troubles!

So...here's my question:
1) If I just apply to all the schools I listed in my MDapp acct. minus all the TX state schools (while I'll still apply to Baylor coz it uses amcas), is it considered to be committing suicide?

2) If option 1 is not too silly to do, in what way should I modify my list of schools so I will still be accepted in the 2010 cycle?

3) Can anyone tell me if I'm stupid or what? Please give me some feedback and tell me what to do.

Thanks
-longhorn09

Are you sure that AMCAS doesn't care about your foreign transcript?

And the cost to have it evaluated is pretty nominal...is that your complaint, the cost? Holy cow, man, you are going to spend thousands of dollars on this process, why get hung up on $130 which is the cost of some of the secondaries you will be filling out...

 

[Beta Cell]

Are you sure that AMCAS doesn't care about your foreign transcript?

And the cost to have it evaluated is pretty nominal...is that your complaint, the cost? Holy cow, man, you are going to spend thousands of dollars on this process, why get hung up on $130 which is the cost of some of the secondaries you will be filling out...

Agreed, applying to schools isn't cheap. $130 is just a drop in the bucket on this one

 

[JJMrK]

Please refers to my mdapp acct. for more of my info.

So.....I know in principle everyone should apply to all of his/her state schools, and it's the golden rule here in sdn. Here's my story: I'm a Texas resident, and hey, there are 7 Texas state schools, which is great. Yup. The problem is, they all use tmdsas instead of amcas. And I transferred to a US college like 3 years ago from a foreign country. I completed my freshmen eduacation overseas. For applying med schools, I already know that all the prereq courses has to be taken here in US, so I retook everything that I took in HongKong (my hometown). I know for long that amcas doesn't care about my overseas transcript at all, which is great. What I've just found out is that tmdsas requires my overseas transcript to be sent to them. Fine, as long as they don't count my foregin courses towards my gpa. And it's cheap too, it's just cost my foreign college about $5 to send the transcript. But what I've just found out is that tmdsas also request me to send my transcript to an evaluating agent to evaluate my transcript, and HOLY SHXT, the cheapest agent costs $130 for that!

I think the cost is just insane, and I hate tmdsas and think they're stupid. Amcas doesn't care about my foreign transcript and tmdsas needs to cost my that many time and money and troubles!

So...here's my question:
1) If I just apply to all the schools I listed in my MDapp acct. minus all the TX state schools (while I'll still apply to Baylor coz it uses amcas), is it considered to be committing suicide?

2) If option 1 is not too silly to do, in what way should I modify my list of schools so I will still be accepted in the 2010 cycle?

3) Can anyone tell me if I'm stupid or what? Please give me some feedback and tell me what to do.

Thanks
-longhorn09

I thought AMCAS wants foreign transcripts also?

 

[ucladoc2b]

1) If I just apply to all the schools I listed in my MDapp acct. minus all the TX state schools (while I'll still apply to Baylor coz it uses amcas), is it considered to be committing suicide?

This is a really bizarre way of asking your question.

 

[witness23]

haha. its not suicide its kinda dumb. i mean you are a smart dude. but you do understand that IS tuition for texas schools are like 12k right (crazy cheap compared to others)? the process costs extra $130. the complaint over cost is a break in logic (to me).

 

[drizzt3117]

You should contact AMCAS about this to determine how they want to treat the foreign transcripts. IIRC, if the classes are PF and individually listed on your school transcript you may not need to submit it but you should verify that probably.

 

[rockaction]

I mean, you do have a pretty stacked resume, with that 4.0 and 40 MCAT. If you're not planning on actually going to any of these state schools you'd probably get a good number of acceptances from the AMCAS-using schools.

I really don't understand the people who apply to 30 some odd schools and spend thousands of dollars on the application process. Maybe just because I don't have a lot of money. But it seems to me that I'd feel comfortable if I had your application in getting into some great schools without having to do the TMDSAS. But people here are generally going to tell you "the more the merrier!" because for some reason I guess everybody likes having that big list on their MDapps page.

But the choice is yours! If the AMCAS really does require you to have the foreign transcript, you might as well do both. But you have to ask yourself this question...are any of those Texas schools your top choices? Because there are plenty of fall-back schools that use AMCAS that would love to take you. Ohio schools are especially nice to OOS applicants.

 

[witness23]

no one likes having a big list or paying for all those schools. some people do, however, understand that financial aid decision has much more of an impact on money than the couple of grand you spend on your application fee.

also, it would be cheaper to travel to texas schools for interview than to fly to ohio or oregon or ny.

 

[longhorn09]

I have called the AMCAS office twice and they told me that they don't verify foreign transcript. So they don't care about foreign transcript.
Anyways, thanks for you guys input. I've decided to do it, I mean ya I will be spending thousands, so another $130 is just....ok. Sorry I was mad yesterday when I just found that out.🙂